


breathe

by satorisbandages



Category: Haikyuu!!
Genre: Angst, Angst and Hurt/Comfort, Implied/Referenced Suicide, M/M, Mental Breakdown, accidental suicide attempt?, author wrote this for an hour straight half asleep, honestly I don’t know what this is, this is the author projecting, trigger warning
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2021-03-04
Updated: 2021-03-04
Packaged: 2021-03-17 06:34:21
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 938
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/29837487
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/satorisbandages/pseuds/satorisbandages
Summary: “sitting at the bottom of the pool, letting our feelings turn into water(we may drown but it’s okay since it’s our love)”
Relationships: Iwaizumi Hajime & Oikawa Tooru, Iwaizumi Hajime/Oikawa Tooru
Comments: 2
Kudos: 12





	breathe

**Author's Note:**

> please be warned that this is kind of a vent work—accidental suicide attempt is a heavy topic.  
> please do not read if that triggers you.  
> (not my original prompt!)  
> (in summary, this is me projecting onto oikawa)  
> it’s 2am so excuse grammar/spelling mistakes.

sometimes tooru wonders what drowning really feels like. 

_ really _ , because he’s already been drowning for years. 

hajime had always been a solid anchor, with a thick chain, keeping tooru down even when the tide was rough and tried to swallow him whole. 

but even the sturdiest of metal can rust. 

so the chain breaks, and tooru is barely floating on layers of salt—who knows if it’s seawater or tears at this point. 

he claws at the air, wanting for nothing more than to break free from this tormenting, but knowing nothing else other than letting the water overflow his senses and blind him in any way it knew. 

tooru had always felt tightness surrounding his heart, his chest, bubbling up into his throat, intoxicating his mind with nothing other than darkness and a traitor that was his brain. 

will it ever stop?

will his chest ever clear?

will he ever be able to breathe normally again?

tooru wonders if he was ever able to breathe normally in the first place. he struggles to remember a time where it was natural, void of the sting of salt, clear and pure and filling for his lungs. 

tooru notices how hajime rusts. how his chains grow brittle, cracking and threatening to let go of tooru, who desperately grasps onto anything he can manage to take into calloused hands. calloused from years of pulling and reaching. 

the chains snap when the distance becomes too great. 

———

tooru cannot breathe. 

his chest feels as though it’s about to burst, but he does not close his mouth. 

he does not let his body win. he wants to breathe purely again, he wants to stop feeling the sting of salt and the roughness of the rocks that do not hesitate to rake his skin. 

and his desire almost wins.  _ almost. _

because it is then when a new chain links itself together, the same, rusty anchor attached to it, but with more determination than before. 

it latches onto tooru. 

he is pulled up. 

tooru tries to fight but he cannot. he is tired, weary, cold. 

he’s freezing. 

then why does the chain feel so warm?

———

tooru’s head breaks the surface of the water. he sputters and coughs and gasps for air, clean and pure and sweet. 

a hand rubs his back with such fervor it feels as though he will have burns plastered on his skin. 

and yet.. he lets it happen. 

———

hajime doesn’t know  _ how _ exactly he had ended up here, but he did. 

here, being tooru’s argentina apartment complex’s public pool. 

it was 3 in the morning. 

and hajime had just pulled a nearly unconscious tooru from the depths of the waters. 

he is panicking, definitely, but he’s oddly calm all at once. he rubs circles into tooru’s back as he gasps for air, shirt clinging to a frail torso, the hair that was always ever so perfect now wet and messed up. 

hajime is slightly in awe. how can he still feel so much love, looking at someone who had nearly drowned in a 6 foot deep pool? tooru himself was taller than that. but he brushed away the thought nonetheless. 

it was silent for a long time. the only noise able to be heard was tooru’s heavy, ragged breathing, small coughs following after his large fit. hajime doesn’t stop rubbing the circles on his back, even after his breathing steadies. 

hajime speaks first. 

“what the fuck, tooru?”

it’s sharp, but not much. hajime couldn’t bear to be anything but gentle with tooru right now. he wrapped an arm around the soaking boy, pulling him close. tooru nestled into the heat with ease, his body trembling. 

tooru wasn’t sure if it was from cold, or fear. 

(probably both.)

———

tooru is exhausted beyond comprehension, in any and every way possible. 

it had been only a few minutes since he had been pulled from the crushing pressure of the water, but he still trembled. 

he was sure it was fear, this time. 

multiple towels had been wrapped snugly around him, courtesy of hajime, who was currently pacing back and forth a few lengths away, trying to calm the brutal war that raged mercilessly in his skull. 

tooru shifted his position, and the movement caught hajime’s attention. tooru was shocked at how closely the other was paying attention to him. 

“tooru,” he breathed out, quick to huddle next to him. “are you okay?”

fear, anger, hurt, warmth, concern—love. 

all whirled in hajime’s unwavering gaze that never once left tooru’s own. 

“i wanted to let my feelings turn into the water, hajime. i’m tired of my chest feeling so heavy.”

silence. 

“there was always a risk that i’d drown; but it’s okay, hajime. it was something that became our love. i was already drowning outside of the water.”

tooru was sure he didn’t make any sense, but he closed his eyes and let sweet air fill his lungs to the brim before diving head first into a much, much needed slumber. 

(he didn’t feel it when hajime simply pressed a sweet kiss to his forehead and carried him back to bed. 

he didn’t feel it when hajime stripped him of his still damp clothes and replaced them with fresh, warm ones. 

he didn’t feel it when hajime, poor, sweet, tired hajime tucked tooru in against his side and let his own warmth bring comfort to the disaster of a boy laying next to him. 

and tooru  _ definitely  _ didn’t feel it when hajime pressed the pads of his fingers to tooru’s cheek, promising silently that he’d never let anything hurt him again. 

even if it were himself.)

**Author's Note:**

> this is not my original prompt. the quote in this work’s summary is one of the answer choices to a uquiz.com quiz that i took that really stuck with me  
> [said uquiz](https://uquiz.com/quiz/d8Bct2/answer-these-questions-and-ill-paint-you-a-picture-of-love)


End file.
